Hi Ron, > [Platt] > Hardly. In Pirsig's own words: > > "A culture that supports the dominance of social values over biological > values is an absolutely superior culture to one that does not, and a > culture that supports the dominance of intellectual values over social > values is absolutely superior to one that does not. It is immoral to > speak > against a people because of the color of their skin, or any other > genetic > characteristic because these are not changeable and don't matter anyway. > > But it is not immoral to speak against a person because of his cultural > characteristics if those cultural characteristics are-immoral. These are > > changeable and they do matter." (Lila, 24)
[Ron] > That's exactly what I stated Platt, we may compare them by their > dynamism > which is what Pirsig is positing in that statement. Sorry but I don't see anything about "dynamism" in the above quote. [Ron] > Making a statement > in MoQ that U.S. culture is more dynamic than Islamic cultures is a true > MoQ statement. Some cultures are more DYNAMIC than others. I don't think it's accurate to say some cultures (Giants) are more dynamic than others. Better to say some cultures allow individuals more freedom to respond to DQ. Perhaps that's your point. If so, we agree. [Ron] >.But when you > drag specific cultural values into the equation and judge cultures based > on those particular cultural values you fall into social fallacy. > Once you cease using intellectual standards of comparison Platt > you fall to Social level assumptions to base value judgments. > Arguments against multiculturalism are social level arguments. > It has no base in intellectual patterns and I doubt you can > make an intellectual appeal against it. Are you suggesting that multiculturalism has no base in intellect and thus cannot be challenged intellectually? No, that can't be because Pirsig makes an excellent intellectual argument agains the multicultural concept (intellectual pattern) that all cultures are morally equal. [Ron] > you are supplying lo quality intellectual patterns in arguments > against multi-culturalism although they are chocked full of > static social level reason to support it. What "social level reason" supports multiculturalism? What are "social level reasons" anyway? [Ron] > It is more moral to say that U.S. culture is more dynamic than Islamic > culture than to say "backward, impoverished and murderous cultures are > inferior to American culture." > Which makes you sound like a collectivist social level cultural elitist > rather than an intellectual individual who makes value judgments from > experience. So you think backward, impoverished and murderous cultures are equal to the American culture? You sound like a collectivist social level multiculturalist academic. I agree with Pirsig that cultures like America who allow individuals freedom to respond to DQ are superior to cultures that are backward, impoverished and murderous. All that said, I'm glad we agree that some cultures are better than others. Platt Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
